Collaborations

Anderson Mason Dale Architects acknowledges that professional mentoring is one of the most valuable resources design practices have for growth and resiliency, and that minority-owned businesses often have more limited access to this type of professional mentoring.

We recognize that our own work and success is only as strong as our regional design community, and we embrace our civic role as an ambassador and advocate for our regional design community. With this said, we commit to seeking professional collaborations with firms that share our design ethos as well as our commitment to service. We seek collaborations as both a mentoring and teaching opportunity as well as an opportunity for our studio to broaden our own design lens and vocabulary.

Building authentic and mutually beneficial relationships with BIPOC businesses will help build a sense of trust, common vocabulary and common purpose within our design community, our clients and our staff, especially as our staff becomes more diverse.

By building a more diverse and inclusive network of collaborators and design partners, our studio will build pathways to future work and future clients that can further reinforce our EDI goals and design culture goals more broadly.

We recognize that promoting BIPOC leaders, will help retain and invigorate a next generation. Many BIPOC leaders have reached points in their career where they have not found tenable pathways for advancement within existing design firms and have ventured out on their own in an effort to create the inclusive and equitable firms that they have long sought. We recognize that supporting and promoting these leaders, will help retain and invigorate a next generation of BIPOC architects and designers who are able to see leaders who look like them within our regional design community.

Research and catalog collaborations from years past.

Document percentages of total design fees represented by MWBE businesses.

Document Owner initiatives and/or thresholds that were part of the solicitation process. Document project types, project values and financial performance of each project.

Promote successful collaborations & collaborators...

on our website and social media as part of our recruitment and retention strategy as well as support for a more diverse regional design community.

Establish a goal to increase MWBE participation...

for projects where criteria is not mandated by owner.

• Establish relationships with 1-2 new MWBE team members per year.

• When building teams, discuss opportunities specific to that project for MWBE collaborators.

• Build a logic for certifications that apply to these metrics.